Saturday 23 June 2018

HIV / AIDs and Human Rights in Manipur


Title: HIV / AIDs and Human Rights in Manipur
Author: Wahengbam Gyanibala
ISBN:  978-93-86934-17-8

About the Author:
Dr. Wahengbam Gyanibala has completed her M.A. (Sociology) from MS University, Vadodara. She completed her PhD. from Manipur University. She is currently working with Government of Manipur.

About the book:

When one studies about HIV/AIDS in Manipur, he comes to understand the importance of studying drug abuse or use in Manipur as the first HIV positive cases were reported among the IDUs (Injecting Drug Users). Studies show that popping of pills was a common practice especially among the urban youths in the early 1970s. By late 1970s there was a shift in the practice of using drugs, a section of youths started injecting morphine and soon injecting of morphine  became very common and popular among the then youths and it spreaded like a fashion in Manipur. In the mid 1980s there was scarcity in the availability of morphine in Imphal and heroin was introduced to the morphine injectors as a substitute. From the mid 1980s injecting of heroin among the youths turn in to an epidemic proportion.

Social Scientists in Digital Information Environment


Title: Social Scientists in Digital Information Environment
Author: Sarangthem Bembem
ISBN:  978-93-86934-18-5

About the book:

In this work Social Scientists in Digital Information Environment undertaken to assess their information needs, information seeking behaviour in digital environment, use of ICT-based services, the problems and barriers encountered, the stock of availability of digital resources in social science and its related organisations has attempted to suggest for designing a model through which the social scientists can meet their information needs. The study covers 463 Social Scientists comprising of Teachers, Teacher cum Researchers, Researchers, Social Workers, Professionals and Others who are engaged in a number of social science and its related organisations/ institutions of Manipur.

Flood Management in India’s North East and Bangladesh


Title: Flood Management in India’s North East and Bangladesh
Author: Priyanka Mallick
ISBN:  978-93-86934-19-2


About the Author:
Dr. Priyanka Mallick completed M.A (2004) in Political Science (specialisation in International Relations) from Banaras Hindu University (BHU), M. Phil (2004-06) in South Asian Studies, School of International Studies, JNU. She got her PhD (2012) from South Asian Studies, School of International Studies, JNU.

She is currently working as Assistant Professor in Christ University, Bangalore. She was earlier working in Delhi University as Assistant Professor.

About the Book:

Floods are an integral part of the inherent variability of nature. It is an attribute of the physical environment and thus is an important component of hydrological cycle of a drainage basin. They are also essential elements in the creation and maintenance of many ecosystems and in the geomorphic evolution of landscape. Flooding is a normal seasonal inundation of floodplain to which traditional settlements, infrastructure and land use are well adapted. It plays a major role in replenishing freshwater resources, recharging wetlands and groundwater and supporting agriculture and fishery systems, thereby making flood plains preferred areas for human settlement and various economic activities. However, floods have negative impacts as well, such as on lives, livelihoods and economic activities and in extreme cases they cause devastation.
A preoccupation with natural events and hydrological processes may lead to a narrow, cosmetic and incomplete understanding of the causes of flood hazards and disasters and to narrowly defined and unsuccessful approaches for addressing them. On the other hand, too much focus on social causes can lead to effective measures aimed at reducing flood risks being overlooked. So, this problem is investigated further through multidisciplinary and environmental approaches by focussing on two case studies, namely Bangladesh and India’s north-eastern region.  
In the Indian sub-continent, India and Bangladesh share three major river systems, Ganga, Brahmaputra and Meghna (GBM), which serve as the life line of millions of people. Due to the excessive water flow in the monsoon months in these three rivers, the people of both the countries suffer from untold miseries due to the occurrence of floods almost every year, particularly in Bangladesh and the north eastern region of India.
India’s North East has all the attributes of a huge powerhouse and reservoir that could transform the region, ameliorate poverty, and generate enormous national wealth. The region receives an average annual rainfall of 2470 mm which drains into one of the largest river system viz. Brahmaputra and Barak. Due to high rainfall, the annual soil loss due to erosion is 455.9 million tonnes, carrying with it about 976 thousand tonnes of nutrient load. After the unexpected heavy floods in 1954, the Government of India took several steps to constitute a number of committees to study flood problems in India. Some important ones are: Policy Statement (1954), Ministerial Committee on flood control (1964), Working Groups on flood control for Five Year Plans, Rashtriya Barh Ayog (1980) and the National Water Policy (2002).
In 1980 The Brahmaputra Board was established by Government with a number of responsibilities related to the development and management of the Brahmaputra and Barak basins, commencing with a series of surveys and investigations that would form a basis for planning. Two mega projects on the Dihang (also called the Siang), the main stream of the Brahmaputra, and the Subansiri were identified. Additional benefits included improved navigation, rich reservoir fisheries, and considerable augmentation of lean season flows, which could possibly be diverted to the Ganga in West Bengal through a major link canal traversing Bangladesh from a barrage at Jogighopa. However, since Bangladesh opposed the link canal idea on a number of grounds, India had to withdraw the proposal.
Bangladesh being the lower riparian is known to be even more vulnerable to floods. Frequent floods have put enormous constraints on its development potential. Unfortunately, the frequency of high intensity floods is on the rise. So far the country has struggled to put a sizeable infrastructure in place to prevent flooding in many parts of the country with limited success. In recent times, it was found that losses of lives and valuable assets could be significantly minimized by implementing non-structural measures including the improvement of flood forecasting and warning system. The existing flood forecasting and warning capacity of Bangladesh could be more effective if real-time data could be acquired from upstream areas within the GBM catchment, where runoff is generated. Bangladesh can develop effective flood forecasting and warning systems with the real-time comprehensive data on water levels in rivers and rainfall, which are available from India in particular, but also from Nepal and Bhutan so as to face the problem well before danger levels are reached.


History and Nature in Amitav Ghosh


Title: History and Nature in Amitav Ghosh
Author: Bhubaneswar Deka
ISBN: 978-93-86934-20-8

About the Author: 
Dr. Bhubaneswar Deka is currently working as Associate Professor and Head of English Department, Pandu College, Pandu, Guwahati, Assam. He has done Ph.D. from Assam University.


The author has many books under his belt. They are Aravinda Kalita Zindabad (Novel-Assamese), Mrigatrishna (Novel-Assamese), Markin Sahityar Rup Aru Rekha (Assamese), English Essays, (edited), Treasure Trove, and Eta Dharal Kolomor Sandhanat (Assamese).

About the Book:

The first part of the book is concentrated on how colonial, pre-colonial and post-colonial history of the subcontinent side by side global history is fictionalized and represented in the fictions and nonfictions of Amitav Ghosh, Indian novelist of the twenty first century. An attempt to re-read political connotations, issues of India’s colonial past and the contemporary world is made in the light of New Historicism. Ghosh’s politics of representation is also surveyed to some extent referring to postcolonialism, globalization, subalternity, neo-colonialism, liminality, binary oppositions, colonial hegemony, ambivalence etc.

In the second part, Ghosh’s concern for the endangered eco-system or his environmental imagination is checked from a new perspective Eco-criticism or Green Cultural Studies. 

Prisoners Rights in Manipur: An Analysis of Legal Aid

Title:  Prisoners Rights in Manipur: An Analysis of Legal Aid Author:  Akham Rajashree ISBN: Language: English First Edition: 2024